I recently shut down Bloudme. It was my second personal project, which started as an RSS reader and quietly died. Before that, there was Podiscover...
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This hits very close to home - having started and abandoned several projects over the years. I usually find myself interested in the problem and once I've worked out that, building the boilerplate staff (register/login, pricing/subscriptions, dashboards and CRUD, terms & privacy pages etc) - with seems to be like 80% of what's involved, and that's before we consider marketing/promotion - drains the motivation quickly.
But I'm an introvert like yourself, so speaking to people and putting myself out there is really difficult, and I find myself repeating the same pattern - but I'm slowly coming to grips and accepting this.
I'd beat myself up for months (I haven't done enough, focused on the wrong thing, should have been working instead of playing the xbox at the weekend, it's not good enough to charge money for yet). And sure, I want some of my side projects to make a little money, but I've realised the build is the part I enjoy, in particular building to scratch my own itch, and nothing kills my projects quicker than putting that on the back burner and spending the majority of my time promoting/marketing them.
I know, it's not an attitude that will have me living off these projects, but it has let me be more comfortable with my "failures" and stop beating myself up as much.
I'm guessing I'm not alone in this, and I wanted to share this as sort of a "don't be so hard on yourself, and enjoy what you're doing" message to those in the same boat.
Maybe join an existing open source project instead? You've got other people "who care" then, and the project would also have 'users' ...
Exactly my thoughts! Joining open-source projects gives both the feeling that you are doing something "useful" for people and the community that cares about the product.
Indeed - "win-win" situation!
It sounds like you are building products even if you don't have the users, but that's clearly not enough otherwise you wouldn't be considering them failures. What does success mean to you? Is the goal full-time entrepreneurship and eventually living off of your side projects?
That's a great question, and honestly one I haven't fully answered for myself yet.
I don't think the goal is full-time entrepreneurship or living off side projects. It's more about the creative need to build things outside of work — and the frustration when those things don't connect with anyone.
Maybe success for me is simpler than I thought: something I build that at least one person finds useful enough to keep using.
I'm almost finished with the project I'm working on now, and (unlike some other projects I've worked on in the past) my motivation is unswerving. Why? Because I am myself the user — it's something I've wanted to have for a long time. I'll publish it and talk to some people about it, maybe make a blog post, but if no one ever uses it but me, the effort will still be justified.
This is actually the healthiest framing I've heard. "I am the user" removes so much pressure. I think I've been building for an imaginary audience instead of solving my own problems first.
This is probably the single approach that doesn't lead to frustration and burnout. One person once told me:
In the end, it's not about the destination, but about the journey that we should embrace and enjoy.
"Do it for yourself" sounds simple but it's surprisingly hard to internalize. Thanks for sharing that — it's a good reminder to check why I'm actually building something before I start.
As the hacker (not attacker) community puts it: "Scratch your own itches."
Thank you for sharing your doubts! I admire how self-reflective and honest you are; that's a really valuable skill 💛
Even though my projects are not programming-related (I am a writer), I see the same patterns in my behaviour:
Need for writing → Excitement → Doubt → Death
I tend to focus too much on what people will think and whether it is even good enough to publish anywhere. This drains all joy and energy for the project, so I kill it. I'm frustrated for some time, and then I start another project – such a vicious circle.
Still not sure what to do about it. I am now learning to enjoy the road instead of thinking about the destination, but it's a really hard mental work to break old patterns.
"Need for writing → Excitement → Doubt → Death" — this is painfully familiar, and honestly it's comforting to know it's not just a developer thing. Breaking old patterns is slow work. Good luck with yours.
So much resonates here! Appreciate you being vulnerable about it.
Thanks for saying that. It felt a bit uncomfortable to write, so I'm glad it landed well.